8
comments:

Trying to play catch-up wayyy too much. *g* I will say this, though, and risk the Joan Wrath: Pit Bulls can be sweet, friendly animals too, and yes, have been unfairly targeted. Everyone wants a scapegoat.

Very often (and not always, because genetics can surprise you in nasty ways) people make them mean, just like any dog can be made mean. Some of the sweetest, most loving dogs I've ever petted have been Pits. I know full well that you can breed two aggressive Pits and get aggressive pups, and very many people do just that, but that holds true for any breed. No animal is born aggressive. Except maybe mosquitoes.

What I'd like to do is gather up all the folks who willingly bend a decent animal, ANY animal to a state where it's aggressive all the time and spay or neuter them.

Well, chihuahuas can be very mean, and can bite, but no one has ever died from it, to my knowledge.

I don't leave a loaded gun, however well trained that gun is, anywhere where it might fall into the wrong hands. That is the inherent danger in guns.

Leaving pit bulls unattended, no matter how well-trained, is like leaving a deadly weapon to uncertain fates. If their jaws and their power weren't expressly for killing other creatures with extreme prejudice, it might be a different story.

But we never hear of a couple of German Shepherds mauling little kids to death. Why is that?

And where do we draw the line? I call your attention to this post. Would you feel comfortable with that in your neighborhood? Would you listen to the owner who tells you what a sweet and adorable hyena it is?

I should have known better than to poke you with a sharp stick and not be armed. *lol*

We do hear about all sorts of dogs maiming and killing people, it simply doesn't make the front page. Mastifs, Rottweilers, mixed breeds...heck, go to New Orleans right now and you can be killed by a pack of house dogs gone feral.

And no, probably not by the little pocket dogs, but tell my wife's Papillion that and she's likely to try to prove you wrong. The media has seized on Pits because that's the sensational flavor of the month. Many animals, not just dogs can and do kill people, at zoos and at people's homes and so forth.

I'm not saying that Pits can't be dangerous, it's obvious they can. They were bred for a purpose and they are good at it. A car is purpose-built, too, and is good at what it does. How many people do cars kill each year, but are we banning them? Destroying them? Heck no! We're building them as fast as we can crank them out, and giving them to anyone who can foot a monthly note. Are these buyers well-trained and responsible? Mostly, no. Same with guns and Pit bulls and motorcycles and boats and etc. They all kill people.

My point is, if there is one to my rather scatterbrained attempt at rebuttal is personal responsibility. Blame the person who trained that Pit by torturing it, by keeping it chained up in a basement, by praising and reinforcing it's behaviour when it kills other dogs. Please don't blame a dumb animal who otherwise would have been some family's lap dog.

Blame the person who pulled the trigger, not the manufacturer of the pistol. We're so desperate to find someone else to blame, why not blame the person, not the tool?

Oh, I totally blame the person, and I don't know if there's a final and good compromise.

However, my gun won't travel off the night stand on its own, and has no inner instinct that can be ignited by circumstance.

My dog is very well-trained, and I can even get her to stop, most of the time, before she totally loses her mind going after a squirrel. But I never forget that it's her instinct that drives her, not my training. My training can step in and adjust her instincts with a different instinct/response, but if I weren't there, she'd be off like a rocket.

She's an animal. She has no instinct to kill other dogs, she has bred instincts to respond to humans and bully cows into orderly groups. She is as safe as her bloodline will allow me trust.

If you could see all the hits I get for "hyena/pit bull mix", you'd understand my worry! Someone will stand up for such a breed eventually.

Joan, I doubt there is either, and I'm certain you get a shiteload of hits off those buzzwords. *sigh* My pistol stays right on the bedside table too, and my daughter knows not to handle it.

My only problem with the issue is the knee-jerk reaction. Pits are bred to be dog aggressive, not people aggressive. I hate it just as much when things go awry, but I also hate the throngs who leap to point fingers at the dog when the person is often the root evil.

GONE!

By the way...

All posts and personal pictures are copyrighted by the author. (Well, except for a picture or two I may have copied from somewhere on the Internet, or from someone else who copied it. If it's yours, let me know and down it comes, 'k? The rest really do come from my own camera.) Anything else should be understood for what it is: musings of a muddled mind. Because the author is maniacally convinced of her own superior skills in communication, she cannot be held responsible for another's misunderstanding. You can see how that would upset her tenuous hold on reality.